5 Ways to increase your chances of getting Laid on a First Date

#1. Clean yourself up and dress masculine and sophisticated.

Three reasons why this improves your odds. Women like men who take care of themselves physically, they should be clean and well groomed. Secondly, women like men who know how to dress themselves - so wearing sophisticated and manly clothing improves your odds dramatically.

So for example just wearing a manly yet sophisticated jacket from Kish Wear - Men's High Fashion, dramatically improves your odds your date will like you.

The problem is that most men tend to dress like slobs, and that does not impress women very much. At the same time however you don't want to come across as emasculated - what you want really is to give the impression with your clothes that you are like a rugged James Bond type who can fist fight a bear and then go dancing all in the same night.

#2. Only go out on dates on Friday night or Saturday night.

Honestly, timing is everything. Women work just like men do, and they don't want to spend the night at a man's place when they have to get up the next morning and work. That would mean showing up at work possibly late, in the wrong clothes, and all sorts of problems. Thus dates on Sunday nights to Thursday nights have a dramatically lower rate of people getting laid. Also, never meet for coffee in the morning or afternoon. Coffee dates are for suckers. Women use coffee dates to browse for men. They are significantly less likely to sleep with someone when they are just browsing.

Avoiding eye contact on a date is a great way to NOT get laid.

#3. Look into her eyes when you talk to her.

This is really important. Do not avoid eye contact when talking, as some men do when they feel uncomfortable. Instead what you need to do is every time you are talking to your date then give them your full attention by looking deep into their eyes when you are talking to them. Try to repeat that when they are talking to you too.

Don't stare at her breasts (although you can sneak a peek briefly), don't check the time on your phone, don't use your cellphone when bored unless she goes to the bathroom (in which case turn it off when she comes back), don't stare at a TV or other women. The only person who should be the centre of your attention is her.

#4. In conversation avoid anything controversial or trivial arguments.

Don't talk about abortion (she may have had one), evolution vs creationism, politics, religion, etc. Instead stick to entertaining topics. If sports come up talk about them briefly, but don't go into great detail about your favourite sport unless she is also very interested in that sport. And even so, know when to stop. If she looks at her watch it is time to switch topics. When it comes to pop culture don't get involved in trivial arguments and then check who is correct on your cellphone. It makes you appear to be the type of person who always has to be right - and arguing about something trivial on a first date is not a good sign.

#5. Clean your apartment / house as if your mother is coming over.

Nothing messes with your feng shui than having a huge mess in the place. You are not going to want to invite a woman over when your place looks like a giant laundry basket of dirty clothes. All your clothing should be in the closet, or neatly piled in a proper laundry basket (or stowed in a laundry bag). The floor should be clean, there should be less than 3 dishes in your sink or the sink should be empty. Your entire apartment / house should be spotless, as if your Great Aunt Ida is coming for a visit soon and she smacks you with her cane if the place isn't perfectly clean.

Furthermore the only things left out, clutter wise, should be your musical instrument, painting, woodworking project, architectural designs, poetry notebook or something creative which you have left on the coffee table. This gives you something to talk about. If you don't do any activities like that your next best option is a coffee table book about traveling overseas. (Because like your Great Aunt Ida, women appreciate a man who is creative / likes to travel abroad. She may be a stickler for cleanliness, but Aunt Ida loves to talk about all the trips she went on when she was younger.)

The same rule above also applies to your car or vehicle. It should be clean, spotless and the only piece of clutter should be a book / map of an area you want to drive to sometime (eg. Ontario's wine region in Niagara).

NOTES

These are just 5 tips that increase your chances of getting laid. They are not a guarantee. You could still mess up by insulting her in some unforeseen way. Or she could turn out to be a headcase / damaged goods, in which case you are better off without her. (Far too many women out there have developed some weird psychological hangups that make them unable to have long term relationships. If you sleep with such a person they might end up stalking you, treating you like dirt, messing your mind, any number of things. You are better off avoiding headcases as they need professional treatment before they can even stand a chance of having a long term relationship.)

Getting laid on a first date is actually a good signifier that your relationship will last a longer period of time and lead to a lasting relationship (possibly even marriage) - at least when it comes to modern women. Conservative / religious women expect to be wooed a lot longer before the courtship reaches the bedroom.

As such it is best to avoid women who are not your counterpart in terms of belief system. Atheists probably should not be dating Christians and vice versa. Muslims and Christians dating, not such a big deal because Jesus is a prophet in Islam. Before meeting women for dates (assuming you met them via online personals) screen out any who are potentially problematic because of their religion. Women who describe themselves as spiritual are okay (and often free spirits sexually), but Roman Catholics or Russian Orthodox might have some antiquated ideas about marriage before sex. (Which is funny, because people who don't have sex before marriage are more likely to have a divorce.)

Now I am not saying you cannot date women who are of a different belief system than yourself. Go right ahead. Just understand that it is not going to be easier when it comes to trying to make the relationship last more then 2 months.

How I missed my chance to have a threesome

Back when I was 21 years old (so many years ago) I was dating a girl who was 18 and still in highschool.

Everything was going fine with the relationship - so I thought - until I found out that she was seeing 7 other guys on a regular basis.

And I was like WTF? Why are you seeing (and sleeping with) 7 other guys?

And she responded that she is just friends with them - friends with benefits. And that I was the same thing, just a friend with benefits.

Myself I was quite heartbroken. So I gave her an ultimatum, break it off the other guys and go out with only me.

Because quite frankly I wanted a monogamous relationship. I didn't want to share her with other men.

She said she would think about it.

Then out of the blue her best friend, a girl she hangs out with a lot whom I had previously met, calls me up and wants to hang out. Clueless, I say okay. So she comes to my university and we hang out on the campus and in my dorm room and I get the distinct impression she is hitting on me. She was saying things like how her boyfriend wasn't doing it for her any more and she was thinking of breaking up with him, etc. Basically trying to put the moves on me.

Meanwhile I am still in my monogamy frame of mind and I politely just hang out with her, nothing happens and she eventually went home looking disappointed.

Now at the time I thought my girlfriend (if you can call her that when she is sleeping with 7 other men) was just sending her friend to spy on me. It was pretty obvious that this was a setup for something - I thought it was to see if I would cheat on her and so I did not.

However I had interpreted everything all wrong. Years later I have finally figured it out.

Her friend was there to determine if I would sleep with her, and then the two of the girls together would somehow (deviously) organize a threesome or some kind of group sex event.

It is blatantly obvious now what their plan was, but at the time I was young, naive and clueless.

I am certain it would have ended badly too. I am too much of a monogamy person that I would have gotten jealous of her sleeping with other men. Other women I could deal with, but not other men.

Disclosure, 1994 film about sexual harrassment

DISCLOSURE - 1994 film starring Michael Douglas and Demi Moore.

The film plot centers around a sexual harassment case in which Michael Douglas' character Tom Sanders charges Demi Moore's character Meredith Johnson with sexual harassment and sexual assault.

What makes this particular film interesting is the whole role reversal of how sexual harassment cases normally go (the male harassing the female) - in combination with office politics, double standards between men and women - and how NO MEANS NO even when it is the man saying no.

In the YouTube clip above Tom Sanders says NO 34 times.

I totally recommend you watch this film. It is simply really awesome.

On a personal note I was sexually harassed during university.

A young woman and myself were in the same student association and one day we had office hours together and she told me that we were destined to be together (she said something about the stars and heavenly bodies aligning) and basically asked me to take her (sexually) on the desk in the office.

I made up an excuse about being double-booked and fled the room. (My girlfriend at the time was none too pleased to hear that another woman had been hitting on me.)

Hasn't happened since then, but she did creep me out to the point that I stopped going to association meetings. In retrospect I probably should have filed a complaint against her with the university - although that would have been a Disclosure esque idea and perhaps drawn unwanted attention.

SPOILER ALERT!

Don't read past this point if you intend to actually watch the movie Disclosure.

In the resulting court case justice wins in the end... and when that fails it turns out that Meredith Johnson's primary goal was to make Tom Sanders look incompetent - both in terms of trying to make it look like he sexually harassed her, except he filed a counter suit and later discovered an audio recording of the sexual assault which gave him an ironclad case against her.

Furthermore, due to further corporate backstabbing, Meredith also tried to make him look incompetent by rigging the factories to make faulty CD-ROM drives - all so she could further herself in the company for an important promotion they were both seeking to get.

But again Tom managed (barely) to outsmart her there by digging up old memos and even video of her, proving that she had deliberately made changes to the manufacturing process in an effort to make him look incompetent.

Whirlwind Romances and Commitment-Phobes at Work

DISCLAIMER - Not all people are commitment-phobes. Some have completely legitimate reasons to end a relationship. Some are just fickle or bored easily. It is my experience that younger people tend to be commitment-phobes and older people are more willing and desiring of a lasting relationship with all the responsibilities that come with it.

LOVE - Have you ever met a woman and after awhile (the term "awhile" can really vary from woman to woman) she starts talking about commitment.

Now commitment could mean many things.

It could mean going steady (which some men fear because they don't like to be tied down to one person and prefer to sleep around / cheat constantly).

It could mean moving in together as part of a natural progression towards marriage.

It could mean marriage itself, with the implied commitment towards having children.

Many of these things have been known to cause bachelors running for the hills, seeking protection and some sort of escape clause from their relationship. This is largely due to a fear of responsibility and/or commitment and/or fear of growing older, settling down, etc.

Usually its young men who are commitment-phobes. The older the man gets the more likely he starts getting fatherly yearnings towards having a wife and kids. And even grandkids. The ol' grow old and die together bit.

For women it is the same problem, but they also have a biological clock that is ticking. Once a woman enters her 30s and hasn't had kids of her own, if she has any plans to do so she had better speed it up and/or lower her standards.

Now there is plenty of nice single men out there. I know, I am one of them. But they're sometimes shy and they can't be hitting on women at work (because that is sexual harassment), they can't hit on women on the subway (because that is just creepy) and meeting women at church only works for those people who are super-religious and have no life.

So where is a man in his 30s supposed to meet a woman his age? Online personals. And there is quite a few out there, but the one I recommend is Plenty of Fish, or if you're very serious about getting married, check out eVow.

So you go through the whole online personals thing, a bit embarrassed at first, but hey, its easier than trying to pick up a woman at a bar and getting rejected in person.

Then Man meets Woman... and here is where we reach the Whirlwind Romance part of my conversation.

If people connect on their first meeting (and sadly most do not connect) they will probably end their first date with a kiss. Anything less than a kiss and she probably doesn't like you, so don't expect a 2nd date unless she actually makes an effort to arrange a 2nd meeting. No Kiss + Zero Effort = No 2nd Date. Capiche?

If they connect very well it might reach one of those baseball euphemism bases... for those who don't know, they are:

First base – French kissing involving the tongue.
Second base – Aggressive stimulation of the upper body, neck, chest, breasts, back, etc.
Third base – Manual or oral stimulation of the genitalia.
Home run – The act of penetrative intercourse, whether vaginal or anal.

Now if the 4th one happens and continues for some time its recommended you get tested for HIV, wear protection (especially if you're sleeping with multiple women), practice self control, etc.

Now eventually one or both of you will become emotionally attached to the other. If this happens quickly, as per a Whirlwind Romance, one or both parties might be tempted to slow it down or even break off the relationship completely (as in you never see her again). Such is the risks associated with having a Whirlwind Romance, they can sometimes end quickly.

Speaking for myself, my Whirlwind Romances usually led to long term relationships, the longest of which lasted 6 years. So in my opinion Whirlwind Romances are a good sign that two people are very compatible.

But not everyone thinks that way. So don't be surprised when women want to slow things down or end it.

Why?

Because women can also be commitment-phobes. They may have other (more legitimate) reasons too, but the core principle is sound. If things happen too fast men typically don't care, so long as the marriage part is slower. For women if things happen too fast they seem to get freaked out easily, possibly due to the fear of the unknown, fear of marriage, fear they're repeating a mistake / trend they've made with other relationships, etc. Any number of legitimate reasons.

Now if you commitment-phobe men out there were paying attention, you may have noticed the escape clause you have been looking for... all you have to do is say:

"I think we're going too fast and should take a break."

Oh sure, the woman is going to accuse you of being a commitment-phobe, and she would be right in doing so. But at least you're being honest for once.

To be fair to her you should also make it clear whether you will ever change your mind.

If you are interested in seeing her later you should say something like: "I just need time to think, but if I come to decision I would like to get back together with you and we could take it slower the second time around."

If you have zero interest in ever seeing her again (because she wasn't your type, was some psychotic nutjob, etc.) you should probably just tell her: "Don't bother waiting for me. I have zero interest in seeing you again. I don't think you are my type anyway. Lets just be friends! You snore and your breath stinks. You make love like a corpse. Etc, etc." You could even email her this blog post and she will get the hint.

Now on the reverse side if its the gal who gets cold feet and becomes commitment-phobic, well then there is nothing you can do about it except try to be supportive (pleading doesn't work, you only feel more pathetic and rejected).

If she says she may change her mind later, great. If not, then you will probably never see her again.

Such is life.

The funny thing about commitment-phobes is that men and women usually go about it differently. Men will typically look for an excuse to end a relationship. Women are more likely to use the "Lets just be friends!" speech or the "Its going too fast!" speech.

All things are equal in love and war, but that doesn't stop us from using different tactics.

Ex Girlfriends or Ex Wives at Work

Ah relationships...

Or more specifically in this case, the ENDING of relationships. Do they ever truly end sometimes? Or do they just drag on and morph into something else?

For example I think there is at least 4 basic scenarios when a serious couple breaks up...

#1. Mutual split, they both hate each other.

#2. Mutual split, they're still friends.

#3. She dumps him, but he still loves her.

#4. He dumps her, but she still loves him.

Next there is sub scenarios...

A. They still talk constantly.

B. They rarely talk.

C. They never talk again.

A2. They have children together and have to talk constantly due to shared custody.

B2. Shared custody but they avoid talking if they can help it because its either painful, awkward, angry, bitter, or something more complicated.

C2. One of the parents' leaves with the children, disappears and never speaks to the other parent ever again.

Of course there will be many other factors (ie. how and why they broke up, whether either of them cheated, whether they were actually married, how long the relationship lasted, rockiness of the relationship, whether they miss each other, are they business colleagues and sometime work together, etc.)...

These days technology has made it easier than ever to send a message to someone's ex. We have email and Facebook and many other ways to find / contact that person. (Unless they disappear and change their name...)

Ideally it is possible to stay friends with the person, but such circumstances seem to be rare. Especially if there is a large amount of bitterness between the couple.

Children wishing their divorced parents would get back together like to believe that anything can happen, including the burying of old hatchets and the rekindling of old flames.

We all would like to think it can happen but the truth is it rarely does. Bitterness is a bit like distrust. Once its there its like a stain on the relationship that never goes away.

Anorexic Women and Arnold Schwarzenegger at Work

HEALTH - I totally understand why Arnold Schwarzenegger cheated on his wife Maria Shriver... and later separated from her in 2010 and now looks to be heading towards divorce.

Have you seen Maria Shriver? She is so anorexic she looks like a skeletal corpse.

When Arnold and Maria first met many years ago Maria Shriver was a thin but reasonably healthy woman. She was in many ways a trophy wife, but had intellect and was a member of the Kennedy Family (and thus a boon to Arnold Schwarzenegger's political career).

However as she got older Maria Shriver became more obsessed with dieting / cutting back on food that she began to look like somekind of undead monster. Combined with this is the associated mental disorders such an eating disorder like anorexia brings with it. She became irritable, obsessive, problematic... in short she became a mental head case.

To treat such a problem what you need is a psychiatrist, which Arnold Schwarzenegger is not.

But what Arnold Schwarzenegger is however is a bodybuilding health nut. To him this wasting away of muscle and fat to leave only skin and bones would have been seen as the opposite of what Maria Shriver should be doing. If she wanted to look beautiful the thing to do is to eat well and exercise. That Arnold certainly knows.

It is therefore perhaps no surprise that approx. 14 years ago that Arnold Schwarzenegger cheated on his wife Maria Shriver in favour of the much more attractive housekeeper Patty (Mildred Patricia Baena) and in the process fathered a son, who has recently been the centre of much media attention.

As a working mother Patty had to take care of Maria and Arnold's four children, cook, clean and do laundry. She was certainly eating healthy and getting lots of exercise. She was a virtual sexy amazon compared to Maria Shriver's withered corpse of a body.

The point I am making here isn't that Arnold cheated on his anorexic wife. I am not endorsing cheating whatsoever. The point I am making is that anorexia is NOT sexy. Never is, never will be.

Only some seriously mentally deficient person would want to have sex with a skeleton. That is just plain sick.

With respect to Arnold Schwarzenegger it is no surprise that he tried to do the honourable thing and hold his family together long enough so his children could all grow up with a family, including the bastard son who apparently spent a reasonable amount of time on his estate. While he kept it a secret from his family, he made the son a welcome part of their extended family.

I would speculate that Arnold Schwarzenegger will eventually find love again in his life, but this time he will pay closer attention to finding someone who shares his interest in healthy diet and exercise.

See Also
The Perfect Female Body at Work
Dissatisfaction with Our Bodies and Eating Disorders
Anorexia in Asia
Thinspiration Sickspiration
Bulimia and Depression

Valentine's Day at Work

Valentine's Day dates back to the Christian martyr Saint Valentine (or Valentinus). His life and death had nothing to do with love however. Valentinus tried to convert the Emperor of Rome to Christianity and was sentenced to death. He was beaten with clubs, stoned and then beheaded outside the Flaminian Gate in Rome.

Very little is actually known about Valentinus in terms of historical fact.

The concept of celebrating Valentine's Day didn't become popular until Geoffrey Chaucer who promoted the idea of courtly love and romance. Chaucer and other bards of his era created many songs and stories promoting romantic love and propagated the myth of Valentine's Day into its modern celebration of romance.

Valentine's Day is actually a pretty busy for both couples and businesses.

Flower shops, chocolate sales, lingerie sales, etc.

But there are plenty of other things people could be doing on, before or after Valentine's Day if they're feeling romantic.

VALENTINE GIFT/ACTIVITY IDEAS

#1. Dance Classes

Some women go weak at the knees when it comes to dancing, but are too afraid to step on a dance floor in a club. Plus there are plenty of people who are simply afraid of the kind of drama, nonsense, drunkenness and even crime that goes on in modern dance clubs and want something more conventional, less formal and where they can actually learn and have fun. Thus dance classes sounds pretty romantic for most people, even if they have difficulty moving about / are embarrassed about it.



#2. Swimming Pools

Now obviously we can't all afford swimming pools, but swimming together has always been a very romantic thought. Heck, if you want a combination of things you can always just watch the film Dirty Dancing together.

I suppose if you actually had the money you could pull a Clark W. Griswold move and announce you are putting in a swimming pool.

#3. Romantic Artwork

Now this is a personal bias since I am an artist and I happen to paint romantic artwork occasionally, but whatever. I am going to guess that there is a fair amount of people out there who share my belief that artwork makes a great Valentine's Day gift.

Of course there might be men (and even women) out there who are more turned on by power tools and the sounds of heavy machinery in the background.

So if you're the type of person who gets turned on by rigid foam insulation (pun deliberate), wall systems or new patio furniture... well then you don't really need Valentine's Day to feel romantic, do you? You probably get turned on just by hearing the ice cream truck and then start making all sorts of crude jokes about cream.

Or maybe you're a green oriented environmentalist? For all we know you might get turned on by solar power hardware (again, pun deliberate) and solar power Ontario MicroFIT programs and solar manufacturing software.

Or maybe you're a vegan? In which case I recommend beautiful-vegan.com.

I think part of the problem with Valentine's Day is that it sometimes sneaks up on people and they forget what day it is. Same with Groundhog Day and Pancake Day, they come and go so quickly sometimes that you forget about them. February just isn't as well known for holidays as October, December or April are. After all you don't even the day off...

So as men today rush out to buy gifts at the last minute many of them will be going straight to the lingerie store first. (Although seriously, the flower shop probably runs out of supplies faster.)

According to our research the big thing in 2011 is vintage lingerie, so things like push-up bras, suspender garter belts, waist cinchers and pin-up stockings with respect to fashion. Blame Mad Men and the recent upshot of interest in retrofuturism / Steampunk.

And don't forget jewelry, another hot item during Valentine's Day, despite gold prices being more than $1,300 per ounce. And perfume... although seriously, you must be running out of ideas if you buy a girl perfume.

In 2009 Canada's Valentine’s Day floriculture sales (before expenses) was $1.44 billion. Figures for 2010 aren't available yet because not all the shops from 2010 have submitted their income tax info yet.

Cosmetic surgeons, dentists, marriage counsellors, online dating services, even divorce lawyers all report an increase in activity on, before or after Valentine's Day.

But the one I really want to talk about is private investigators.

Apparently Valentine's Day is the busiest day of the year for PIs (business goes up 150% above normal according to one source), due to the number of people cheating on Valentine's Day. Spouses get suspicious, they start thinking of divorce, they hire a PI, and then the next thing you know they're headed to the divorce lawyer.

For fun, go watch Burn After Reading too. Spoiler alert! The bits about the divorce lawyer and private investigators are quite funny.



It makes me wonder what the statistics are for the number of divorces that happen in the months AFTER Valentine's. I mean first you find out they are cheating on you, then you hire a marriage counsellor, then you agree to the divorce, then you have to hire a real estate agent, and a home stager because neither of you wants to live in the house together, and then voila... finally the sale of the house, the division of the spoils of love and war, and its over.

Meanwhile in the United States... Americans are planning to spend an average of $116.21 USD on Valentine's Day, up 11% from last year’s $103 (a sure sign of economic recovery if I ever saw one). [Source: National Retail Federation]

Total Valentine's Day spending is expected to reach $15.7 billion, up from $14.1 billion in 2010, but still lower than pre-recession levels.

In order of significance (2011 polls):

Greeting cards: 52.1%
Jewelry: 17.3% (up from 15.5% in 2010)
Florist: 16.8%

Its difficult to track how much people spend on clothing, flowers, candy etc because prices can vary wildly and could cover everything from cinnamon hearts to red hats.

Interesting fact! Men spend roughly double what women spend on Valentine's. The average man spends $158.71 whereas the average woman spends $75.79.

And oddly enough women are more likely to spend their amount on personal things, like hair salons and grooming.

The age difference is also a big deal. Adults 25 to 34 will spend an average of $189.97 USD, compared to the $60.22 USD that adults 65 and older will spend.

30% of couples are planning to dine out tonight.

$9.3 billion is the expected amount of Valentine’s Day gift spending (not including dinner, transportation, etc) on partners today.

$681 million Valentine’s gift spending on pets (a surprising number of people buy things for their pets today... loneliness maybe?)

*Source: National Retail Federation

See my past post: Valentine's Day Primer

Breadwinning & Cheating at Work

SEX - According to new research was recently presented at the American Sociological Association...

Spouses that are financially dependent on their spouse are more likely to cheat, and this is the same regardless of whether they are male or female.

This flies in face of the belief (now proven false) that if someone is financially dependent they will be more faithful. This is actually the opposite. Feeling dependent on someone causes depression and people naturally end up looking for someone else to be their new soulmate, someone with whom they are on a more equal footing.

According to the report people often need an ego boost and an extramarital affair (a big secret) often feels like an ego boost (at least in the beginning). The report doesn't go into detail about what happens after the affair is over, whether the cheater ever confesses and what repercussions occur.

The report, titled "The Effect of Relative Income Disparity on Infidelity for Men and Women", is by Christin Munsch a sociology Ph.D. student at Cornell University and tracks 18 to 28 year old married or common-law couples who were together for more than a year. The report also takes into account and compensates for issues of age, education level, income, religious attendance and relationship satisfaction.

Apparently men are especially vulnerable to infidelity because they traditionally fit the role of breadwinner and when the wife or girlfriend makes more than they do it sparks feelings of inadequacy.

Measurement wise men who are 100% dependent on the women's income are 5 times more likely to cheat.

However this is another factor this report ignores... its called more free time = more time available to cheat. A wife who works 9 to 5 means the husband has plenty of time to cheat in the morning and afternoon.

The reverse is also true however... men who make significantly more than their female counterparts are also more likely to cheat.

The only time men aren't likely to cheat is when their partners make roughly the same or 75% of their incomes.



However this doesn't mean women should be discouraged from pursuing higher paying jobs and careers. If anything this discourages both men and women from chasing after the higher paying jobs because they are both more likely to cheat (and likewise their spouses are more likely to cheat) when there is a huge gap in their salaries.

The good news is that cheaters' wandering eyes stop wandering so much as they age. They might still be looking, but they're not acting on their sexual impulses as much as they did when they were younger.

On a personal note I believe a couple, any couple, should be obsessed with each other. They wouldn't even think of cheating because they are so utterly obsessed and in love with the other person.

Furthermore, it has to be mutual. You can't have one person obsessed with the other, doting on them, bestoying affection and romantic gestures all the time, because then the other person who isn't obsessed and in love feels like they're being smothered and begins to find all the attention annoying.

Its much better to be obsessed and lovey-dovey with each other, because at least then you're only annoying other people who have to endure the public displays of affection and not the ones you care about.

"If you marry a man who cheats on his wife, you'll be married to a man who cheats on his wife." - Ann Landers.

Helen Gurley Brown at Work

FASHION/FEMINISM - Helen Gurley Brown became the editor of Cosmopolitan magazine in 1965 and quickly changed the magazine into one that was just for women (from 1886 to 1864 it had been a more family oriented magazine).

But that is not all she did. As a sexually liberated single woman Helen Gurley Brown also brought to the magazine her own manifesto of what she thought women should behave like. In a word, golddiggers.

In her best-selling book "Sex and the Single Girl" and 8 other books that followed Helen Gurley Brown perpetuated her belief that women could have it all, namely "love, sex, and money" by simply playing the role of a woman who attracts and snares men, and then controls them using sex in an effort to gain money and power.

And when you're done with them, men are disposable and easily replaced.

This obviously comes from a woman who wasn't worried about losing her good looks.

It should be noted that many notable feminists of the time, including Betty Friedan and Germaine Greer, did not support Gurley Brown's manifesto of controlling men through sex. Gurley Brown's concepts which focused on fashion, beauty, fame and using men for sex/money were arguably a step backwards in the women's liberation movement because it promoted the idea that women should behave like tramps and sluts, but only if they're getting a lot of money.

Helen Gurley Brown continued on as editor-in-chief until 1997. She is still alive currently.

But during her 32 years in control of one of the most influential women's magazines in the United States Helen Gurley Brown managed to sway quite a few young women (the Cosmo Girl / Sex and the City generation) to her cause.

While she did claim love was a factor in her philosophy (she married movie producer David Brown in 1959) they never had any children, instead enjoying the wealthy life with no kids to worry about... but lets just test Google and see how many hits for the word love comes up on cosmopolitan.com... 11,400

12,800 hits for the word "sex".

11,800 hits for the word "guy".

2,980 hits for the word "boyfriend".

681 hits for the word "husband".

So apparently husbands aren't high on the list of priorities. Guys are okay, but guys are disposable. And love is slightly less popular than sex. (The actual "love articles" are really more about "making love" than actual romantic love.

3,420 hits for the word "romance".

Heck, lets have some more fun with this...

6,860 hits for the word "hair".

6,570 hits for the word "fashion".

3,860 hits for the words "kama sutra".

501 hits for the word "cheating" (the top articles that came up were "How to Tell if a Guy Is Cheating", "Stop Him From Cheating" and "Is Cheating Always Wrong?").

478 hits for the words "paris hilton".

413 hits for the word "marriage".

So apparently Paris Hilton is moderately less important than husbands, and approx. 15% more popular than marriage. Yeah, I think we get the picture here.

Cosmopolitan... the magazine for slutty golddiggers who don't like marriage but are just marginally better than prostitutes because they pick and choose which rich guys they want to seduce. Its completely unrealistic too (men with good looks and wealth are hard to come by and if you do they are either a: already taken or b: likely to cheat). And women wonder why men get upset about such women and call them b*tches or worse.

You see men are sensitive creatures. We may not like to admit it, but we're very self-conscious about it. We want to be loved like any other human being... but when someone is used and abused by someone they thought (or hoped) might love them, the shock and pain of such betrayal is to be expected.

Yes, the modern Cosmo magazine has helped women feel more sexually liberated, we will give Helen Gurley Brown some of the credit for that. But at what cost? This concept of hunting rich men and then using them for their money is just plain ethically wrong.

If you want money go out and earn it like a regular person. Feminists didn't fight for equality so women could sponge off rich men. They wanted to stand on their own two feet. Gurley Brown's philosophy is a throw back to Parisian courtesans, which some people may romanticize, but in reality were closer to upper-class prostitutes.

Where is the love in using someone like that? Love in such a scenario becomes a tool, a weakness which the woman can exploit and use to her advantage.

If a man did such a thing women would be up in arms and asking for his head on a platter, but women who do it are being praised by Cosmopolitan... despite the fact that these scenarios usually end badly.

Remember Monica Lewinsky and Bill Clinton? Her affair with the president was more about his power than anything else. She wanted POWER over him and it blew up in her face (pun intended).

That is the Cosmo Girl in action. Such actions will always come back to haunt people.